


Revelations in Purgatory

by smellbig



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F, Fluff, Go read it!, ps! if you haven't read performativezippers' fic yet!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-01
Updated: 2017-09-08
Packaged: 2018-12-22 08:06:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11963214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smellbig/pseuds/smellbig
Summary: Waverly smiled, and sighed. She was young, but knew beauty when she saw it.Her soulmate loved cats. And she was starting to love him.





	1. Revelation #1 - Favorite Animal

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Revelations](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11289825) by [performativezippers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/performativezippers/pseuds/performativezippers). 



> Hello friends! I'd like to start off by saying this AU is based off the "Revelations" AU fic by performativezippers here on ao3! While this Wynonna Earp "spinoff" fic of sorts is written by me, the idea and general timeline of the Revelations universe was entirely their idea and creation so! Credits for the idea and such goes to them. If you like what you read here, go read their fic! it's awesome! (Plus, I didn't really go into the full explanation of how all of this works as much as they did, so I guess it's smart to read at least the first chapter of their fic so you get how it all works if you know what I mean :p)
> 
> Thank you for reading, a new chapter will come out every week! Follow me on tumblr @ smellbig to find sneak peaks and updates and such!

“Cats!”

“Waverly, I swear to god,” Wynonna’s voice, obviously disapproving, resonated through the Homestead’s thin walls. “What time is it?”

Waverly threw the covers back from her bed and ran to her older sister’s room. Wynonna groaned as the door opened, rolling over on her side to glance at the clock. “7:30? Jesus, Waverly.”

Her voice grew louder, the smile spreading across her face. “Sorry, Wynonna, but it’s Revelation Day!” Waverly stuck out her left arm. “Look! A cat!”

“Aw, shit, is it really the eighth already?” Waverly nodded, smiling expectantly. “Shit, I forgot again, Waves, I’m really sorry. You just sit tight, I’ll get daddy to take us to get ice cream-”

“Waverly! Shouldn’t you be in your room?”

Wynonna spoke up before the youngest Earp daughter could say anything. “She was showing me her Revelation. It’s her 5th birthday.” Wynonna pulled Waverly closer to the bed and spun her so her arms, covered with dark black ink, were visible. Willa glanced quickly. 

“Hm. Well, I’m sure you know how I feel about the whole thing, Wynonna. Revelations are-”

“A private subject matter, for behind closed doors, yeah, whatever. It’s an animal, Willa.” Wynonna gently shoved Waverly toward the oldest girl. “She’s five, and look, it’s a cat. Her soulmate likes cats. No harm, okay?”

Willa glared at Wynonna, then looked down at Waverly, eight years her junior. “Fine. I won’t tell daddy you were out of your room. But you,” she pointed a finger at Wynonna, “I am disappointed in. You know how I feel.” Willa pivoted and began to walk out of the room, before she stopped, and glanced over her shoulder at the young girl. “Happy birthday, Waverly.”

She smiled to herself. It would be the only well wishes she would ever receive from Willa.

-

After dinner that night, Waverly slipped into her room upstairs for the night and took off her jacket. She was hot and frankly quite uncomfortable in Wynonna’s large and unkempt hand-me-down flannel, and it was much easier to play with her dolls when there weren’t floppy sleeves in the way.

But as she pulled her arms out of her sleeves, she remembered. Her right arm was covered in pictures of horses from top to bottom. They galloped across her skin like a meadow, each with different patterns on their fur. She admired each one in turn, running her hands along the four legs of a Clydesdale, then a Percheron, and a Mustang. Her fingers landed upon a certain stallion she could not identify, the largest horse on her arm. It was a long necked, long legged beauty with a short mane and a straight-haired tail.

In a minute, she had pulled a book off of her bookshelf and was examining it closely. Each page held a gorgeous horse, in full color, as if someone had taken her Revelation, laid it on paper, and Bob Ross’d it to life. Suddenly, she stopped flipping and began to read. There was on the page in front her a chestnut colored horse with a brilliant black tail. The book described it as a loyal, intelligent breed, which came in many colors - gray, black, spotted, white - but most notably, stunningly bright ginger.

An Arabian horse. Her favorite animal, taken from the crook of her elbow and repainted on the glossy pages of this book, in a glorious ginger form.

She closed the book contently and turned her head left.

All along her left arm from shoulder to wrist were intricate drawings of cats. Beautiful, bold, detailed cats, with long snouts and diamonds for foreheads. Each was slightly different; one had long flowing whiskers, another had a winding tail. But two in particular caught her eye. 

At the crest of her arm, just below her shoulder bone, two cats intertwined around the width of her skin. In the uniquely colored ink scribbled over her skin like an award winning art piece were two gorgeous cats, their triangle noses pressed together, mouths upturned slightly in a passive but pleasant smile. Their tails swept back to the inside of her arm, where they curled around into a heart. Waverly smiled, and sighed. She was young, but knew beauty when she saw it.

Her soulmate loved cats. 

And she was starting to love him.

-

A mere four months earlier, a bit more than 2,000 miles away in a small apartment in downtown Chicago, a girl with fiery red hair woke up on her fifth birthday to find her left arm covered in a sleeve of magical horses. One had a unicorn horn.

She smiled - nay, smirked - to herself as her mom and dad looked on, wondering what 5-year-old boy loved unicorns that much.


	2. Revelation #2 - First Initial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Don’t you want to know what it says? There?” Aunt Gus motioned to the young girl’s left arm.
> 
> “I already know what it’s going to say,” she mumbled.

The sweet, familiar smell of lavender crept into her dreams, a sure sign that Aunt Gus had entered the room. A pair of wrinkly yet soft hands pulled back the covers slowly, and Waverly’s mouth downturned into a frown as she crept out of sleep.

“Happy birthday, Waverly,” Aunt Gus whispered. Waverly’s eyes shot open. “It’s Revelation Day, honey. Have you looked yet?”

Waverly met her eyes. “No. I, oh, I completely forgot.”

She lifted her right arm quickly. In her curly handwriting, just below her wrist, was a large ‘W’, as if she had taken a sharpie and began to scribble her name. It was gorgeous.

But that she had known would be there. Waverly started with a W, it only made sense that she would see that plastered on her wrist on the morning of her 7th birthday. She hesitated on raising her left arm, because on that wrist would be the first letter of her soulmate’s name. There were only 26 options to chose from, but each seemed more intriguing than the last.

Adam? Brian? Connor? Connor just made sense; her soulmate would be a short boy named Connor who loved cats. In that moment, Waverly decided what her wrist would say. C.

Aunt Gus ran her finger over the W, then looked Waverly in the eyes. “Don’t you want to know what it says? There?” She motioned to the young girl’s left arm.

“I already know what it’s going to say,” she mumbled, allowing Gus’ gentle touch to turn over her arm.

In blocky letters - her soulmate’s handwriting, strict and jagged - was a bold ‘N’. All straight lines, no frill about it. “Wow,” Waverly whispered. Just a moment ago, she had been so sure…

“You two are so different,” Aunt Gus joked, looking between the two letters. “I remember when I saw Curtis’ C for the first time. He had the  _ worst  _ handwriting.” She laughed. “I’ve told you this before, right?”

Waverly smiled and met her aunt’s eyes. “Yeah, it’s okay, though. Tell me again how you met?”

Aunt Gus took Waverly’s hand, motioning for her to leave the bed. “After breakfast, sweetie. I made your favorite.”

“Apple pancakes?” Gus McCready nodded. “Oh, you’re the  _ best _ , Aunt Gus!”

Waverly hugged her tight, then ran through the door towards the kitchen, dropping her left arm to her side, the N forgotten.

-

“I started brainstorming. Look,” Waverly said as she opened her journal to a bookmarked page. “Nick, Nathan, Niles…”

Chrissy sneered. “Maybe his name is something stupid, like Neville.”

“Neville’s not stupid, it’s sweet.”

“He probably thinks your name is like, Wendy, or Waterfall.”

Waverly frowned. “I don’t know, I mean, what if he hates the letter W?” Chrissy shrugged.

“He doesn’t really have a choice.” She looked at the drawing of the N that Waverly had made in the journal, an exact replica of the one that had been inked on her left wrist for 24 hours. The letter may have faded, but Waverly was sure she wouldn’t forget what it had looked like.

Chrissy, on the other hand, didn’t seem to care much about the whole soulmate thing. Part of that was because she already knew who her’s was - Danny Cox’s favorite animal was a bear and Chrissy’s was a penguin, and they had had each other’s favorite animals two years ago on their first Revelation. On their birthdays they had each other’s initials. Waverly assumed it was much easier to ignore the whole thing when the mystery and fantasy of it all had faded. “Easy for you to say,” Waverly muttered. 

Life with Aunt Gus was so different than with daddy, and Wynonna, and Willa, back at the Homestead. Waverly wasn’t allowed to talk about Revelations, except in private, because Willa didn’t like them, ever since she found out her soulmate liked gardening, which she  _ hated _ . Aunt Gus, on the other hand, loved the fanfare that came with birthdays, on Revelation years and otherwise. Even before Wynonna had….left….Waverly always got a card from Aunt Gus on her birthday, saying she couldn’t wait to see her and give her a big hug. Now, living with her aunt and uncle above their bar, Shorty’s, Waverly wondered if this is what life was supposed to be like.

She missed Wynonna, of course she did, but rarely did she find herself wishing for Willa or daddy to be back. She was only 4 when momma left, 6 when Willa and daddy died, and Wynonna left...she was ready to have a normal childhood, and Aunt Gus was ready for her to be normal, too. 

Well, as normal as it got in Purgatory. It didn’t help Waverly that her best friend was the sheriff's daughter, and that sheriff spent a lot of his time trying to figure out what he was going to do with one Wynonna Earp.

Waverly Earp, on the other hand, was an angel, but she would never be free from her sister’s shadow. At least, not while that said sister was in psychiatric prison just a few miles away.

September 8th was the one day of the year Waverly was afforded a chance to forget about all of that and instead focus on the one person she knew she could trust. Her soulmate. Her soulmate, who liked cats and had a name starting with N. Maybe it was Noah? She jotted that one down in the notebook. Noah was a pretty name.

Noah and Waverly. Waverly and Noah. That had a nice ring to it.

-

The redheaded girl from the midwest got in trouble at school that day. She had drawn little curly W’s all over her math homework.

When asked why, she responded flatly, “Horsey made me do it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to challenge myself and do chapter releases twice a week, once on Monday and again on Friday, that should spice things up a bit :) Also, the chapters will get longer as Waverly ages I promise lol


	3. Revelation #3 - Location

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Waverly hated to admit it, but she was genuinely scared to learn her soulmate’s whereabouts.
> 
> It was a bittersweet Revelation. The best, the worst, the most mediocre. The most underwhelming and overwhelming, all at the same time.

Two days before her ninth birthday, Waverly Earp had a sleepover. 

Luckily her birthday was a Sunday, meaning that she could have her friends over Friday night into Saturday morning, and then spend her birthday with her family. They made popcorn and watched scary movies. They talked about boys and Aunt Gus taught them how to paint their nails so they sparkled like galaxies on the tips of their fingers. Just past 2 in the morning, the final movie finished, and for the first time all night the apartment’s spare bedroom that was just a little bit bigger than Waverly's room fell silent.

After hours of partying, the girls had fallen asleep. 

Except for Waverly. She was running her fingers slowly up and down her arms. In twenty-four hours, they would be covered in the ink of her third Revelation. 

This was the one her scholarly mind was most interested in so far. It would tell her exactly how far away her soulmate was. He could be just down the road, like Chrissy’s - she and her soulmate Danny rode the same  _ bus _ to school - or he could be millions of miles away, somewhere beyond even the galaxies painted on her fingernails. 

She sighed and squeezed her eyes shut. She was beyond tired, but wasn't sleepy at all. Thoughts ran through her mind, urgently demanding her attention. 

What if he  _ was _ in Purgatory? Who did she know from Purgatory who’s name started with N and liked cats? Nathaniel Smith was the only boy she could think of with an N for his first initial and he hated cats. At least, that's what he had told Chrissy when she had asked him about Waverly. 

She shuddered thinking about that. Nate was kind of cute, for a blonde haired boy, Waverly had begrudgingly admitted. She had been  _ so  _ embarrassed when Chrissy had asked him about her. 

But there was only one boy in the whole school she found slightly attractive. His name was Champ, and he was tall, burly, and, unfortunately for Waverly, loved by all the girls in Purgatory Elementary. He surely wasn’t her soulmate, and part of Waverly wondered if she liked him just because all her friends liked him. 

Was anything about her truly her own personality? She hated painting her nails, but her friends liked too, so she did. And she hated horror movies, but for the last eight hours, she had watched only the scariest movies Isabelle could sneak out of her dad’s basement. What about this party had been for her? The ice cream cake, maybe. But what else about Waverly was  _ for _ Waverly?

She fell asleep tossing that idea over in her head, Champ’s smirking face far from the front of her mind. 

-

On Sunday morning, Waverly woke up exhausted. She had struggled to fall asleep the night before, garnering the second night of restless sleep in a row. Uncle Curtis had told Waverly she could sleep in for as long as she wanted and go anywhere she chose for dinner. She admitted that birthdays were pretty cool.

Waverly had told Aunt Gus every detail of her two Revelations thus far, but she had decided the night before she was going to keep this one to herself. She wasn’t even sure if she would tell her friends. Waverly was afraid that if her soulmate lived close to Purgatory, everyone would be trying to figure out who it was and how to set them up. But ultimately, this was  _ Waverly’s _ soulmate; not Chrissy’s, or Aunt Gus’, or anybody else’s.

Waverly sat unmoving in her bed for awhile, knowing that this Revelation could possibly be the most life changing one of them all. Others might have been more meaningful or personal, like biggest fear at 13 or greatest desire at 17, but this Revelation was the one that broke or sealed the most hearts.

It told you whether that boy from down the street with the matching first initial and animal interest was actually your soulmate, or just a terribly unfunny trick that the had universe played on you.

For some, this was the most heartbreaking Revelation of all. For others, it was the best news of the year.

And for the rest, like Waverly, it told you how far you would have to go to find your other half. She was ready for the adventure.

-

It was nearly 11 AM when she finally had the courage to pull her right arm out from underneath the covers. On the inside skin of her arm were two maps.

The first was a formal, but basic, sketch of Canada, with no cities or bodies of water marked with words. Instead, only a thin, faint line outlined the borders of the provinces, and a small star in the east marked Ottawa. Smack dab in the center of the most southwesterly province was a small filled in circle with another circle around it.

The second map was a more detailed drawing of just British Columbia. In the bottom left, Victoria, the capital of the province, was established by a star. Almost directly north about half the length of the province was that same double circle, a clear indication of where Waverly was living. Just below the C in the words “British Columbia”, which were inscribed in the same curly handwriting from the second Revelation inside the drawing of the province, were the same two bold circles. 

Purgatory. 

Waverly tried to imagine it from the point of view of her soulmate. Of course, she had yet to look and see if he was a 5 minute or a 5  _ day  _ drive away. But she could just imagine looking at the mark of an obscure town, and wondering what on earth would compel someone to live in the middle of nowhere. A town so minuscule it barely registered when driving through it. 

When she was done gazing at the map, Waverly attempted to move her left arm, but to no avail. It felt like a brick attached to her shoulder, the weight of the impending information so large it weighed her down physically. She hated to admit it, but she was genuinely scared to learn her soulmate’s whereabouts.

It was a bittersweet Revelation. The best, the worst, the most mediocre. The most underwhelming and overwhelming, all at the same time.

She used her right hand to pull off the covers.

Once again, two maps were visible on her forearm. Similar to the first map of Canada she had seen, an outline of the continental U.S. was penned in unbroken print. Underneath the most one of the Great Lakes - Lake Michigan, she remembered from geography class - were two small circles matching the ones on her right arm; a ring around a solid locus.

Waverly was a smart girl. She didn’t need to look at the second map, one of the state of Illinois, to know what she was looking at.

Chicago. Back when she was still living at the Homestead, Aunt Gus and Uncle Curtis had gone to Chicago on vacation and sent back a postcard. Then, Waverly had pulled out every book on the library shelves to learn about the windy city. And now, all that had paid off.

Because her soulmate was  _ from. Chicago. _

The strangest, most surreal thought fell into her mind. What if Aunt Gus had walked by her soulmate on the street? What if Uncle Curtis had gone into her soulmate’s family’s coffee shop and ordered a coffee from her soulmate’s father, unknowingly? 

Unlikely as it was, it was still so strange to her.

And she let out a sigh of relief. She had yet to meet her soulmate. It wasn’t until that moment that Waverly realized how relieved she was. There was still time, to prepare herself and make a good first impression. To find out who  _ she  _ was, not who everyone else made her out to be. Time to prepare herself for meeting the boy who had traveled millions of light-years through the galaxies, in millions of forms and trillions of molecules, landing somewhere within the universe Waverly was lucky to call home. 

There was still time.

Better yet, there were still four more Revelations.

With that, the nine-year-old pulled the covers back over her suddenly featherweight arms, and fell asleep again.

-

Although the young girl wouldn’t tell her mother and father where her soulmate was from, it was pretty obvious to them on the morning of her ninth birthday. 

Every five minutes it was Canada this and Vancouver that. She asked for a trip to British Columbia for her tenth birthday, 364 days before it happened.

She had never been all that great at keeping secrets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed! Thank you for all the positive feedback, I am beyond grateful!! Keep it coming ;)
> 
> Also, happy birthday Waverly!
> 
> See you on Monday :)

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Once again, universe credits go to performativezippers!
> 
> Follow me on tumblr @ smellbig for updates :) See you soon!
> 
> (PS: leave a kudos and a comment if you enjoyed, it means the world!)


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